Starting off the semester with freshman in the classes, I didn’t really know how the year would go. I just knew that there will be fun and interesting projects to do which is exactly what happened because I always enjoy the projects I do at High Tech High. During the projects some things I worked on is self management, collaboration and communication with peers and teachers. With the projects I had this semester I had to be able to do things independently because the teachers weren’t there to help me every step of the way. There were many mini projects they had to keep track of so I worked on being able to self manage myself and complete the tasks that needed to be done. Secondly I worked on collaboration with new people such as freshman and people that I wouldn’t usually work with. Because there was project after project from balsa rocket to solar ovens to bigger rockets then astrophotography I was collaborating with new people in every mini project. Lastly since I had to work independently and be capable of self managing myself in the projects I also needed to be able to communicate with group members and teachers because we are a team that has to work together.
This semester I learned so many new things about chemistry. As a class we were able to do labs which really helped the learning experience. I learned a lot about atoms and phases of matter that can be change by temperature and pressure of the environment. Secondly I grew academically in math because I learned about Quadratics and imaginary numbers. I didn’t even know something like imaginary numbers existed. My last academic area of growth would be knowing more about our world. Through the Spaceship Earth project I was able to learn more about the world and how the things we do on it is killing it and so many people don’t even know the beauty of the universe to care for it. I believe I met my goal at the beginning of the semester because I wanted to learn and experience new things through this semester projects which I did do through the balsa rockets and astrophotography. My two goals for next semester is working on not taking over when it comes to group projects, which I did this semester but I still need to work on that, and to start studying for the SAT which I plan on doing by getting a textbook and studying on daily basis to prepare for the test. I was very engaged in the projects this semester. When it comes to the projects we do at school I’m very open minded to try it out and I was especially fascinated by astrophotography because I have never done it before and was very excited to try it out. If I were to construct my own project I think it would be mostly revolved around the “Real World” where the students will learn how to get a job, save money and just prepare for what's to come after high school because the school prepares us for college but not really everything else. And I hope that they will learn how to prioritize important things when it comes to self managing. I know that these projects really had the teachers pre occupied so they wouldn’t have time to really grade things and what not but it would have been nice if we were able to write a few essays in humanities to improve our writing. Also in chemistry it would be nice to keep on learning the things we were being taught to better understand it.
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Andromeda Galaxy, also known as Messier 31 or M31, is a spiral galaxy located about 2.5 million light-years away from Earth. Located in the Andromeda constellation, it is the closest major spiral galaxy to the Milky Way, where our solar system is, but it isn’t the closest galaxy. It is also the largest galaxy of what is called the Local Cluster - a collection of more than 54 galaxies including the Milky Way. The Andromeda Galaxy is the most distant object you can spot with the naked eye in the Northern Hemisphere. It should appear as a smudge in the sky, even with moderate light pollution in the area. While Andromeda is the largest galaxy in the Local Cluster it may not be the most massive. The Milky Way is thought to contain more dark matter, which could make it much more massive. The Andromeda Galaxy has a very crowded double nucleus. Not only does it have a massive star cluster right at its heart, but it also has at least one supermassive black hole hidden at the core. It has a diameter of about 165,000 light-years and contains at least 200 billion stars.
Our group chose the Canon 6D DSLR camera for our first astrophotography outing because it was the only one available. Some drawbacks from this camera is having no tilt screen which makes composition and focusing harder and it doesn't have an intervalometer which means we would need an additional accessory. But the benefits of the camera is: it's the lightest full frame DSLR and it has a great low-light high ISO performance.
How to set up an Advanced VX telescope mount:
Set Up Video #1 Set Up Video #2 1. Stand the tripod upright and pull the tripod legs apart until each leg is fully extended. 2. Slide the accessory tray over the central rod so that each arm of the tray is pushing against the inside of the tripod legs 3. Make sure mount is leveled 4. Hold the equatorial mount over the tripod head so the azimuth housing is above the metal peg 5. Push the knob located on the central rod on the underside of the tripod head upward and turn it clockwise to hold the equatorial mount firmly in place. 6. Tighten the hinges of the mount so it wouldn't move 7. Screw on counter weight rod to mount 8. Slide counter weights onto the rod and tighten them securely 9. Screw on corrector, visual backing and star diagonal onto the telescope 10. Attach telescope and tighten securely 11. Loosen the hinges of the mount that you tightened in step 6 12. Move the counterweight to a point where it balances the telescope 13. Plug in remote into hand controller hole 14. Plug in wire from declination to disc point 15. Attach to power pack November 3rd Outing-
(M33) Triangulum Galaxy:
(M31) Andromeda Galaxy:
NGC 6745 Galaxy:
My group members consisted of Jackie, Brandon, Mitch and myself, our film is about a man who just graduated from high school seeks adventure on his own and dared himself to try something new, so when he found a skydiving flyer while walking down the sidewalk he decided to just do it. He experienced the greatness of being independent and can live confidently. Mitch Coleman was the star of this film, Jacquelyn Robles was the cameraman, Brandon Banuelos was the editor and Kayla Jimenez was the director and storyboard maker. As a group we chose to create this film because we are all currently in high school and in only a couple of years we will need to learn to become independent people because when we move away for college we will be on our own for the first time in our lives. This film specifically represented me because I always dare myself to try something new in life.
For our group's rocket, the launch was successful, it went about 1,000 feet into the air and the ejection charge worked great. The only downside to it was the parachute not opening up all the way which was the problem with a lot of other group’s rockets. This project was a very eye opening experience allowing me to try and learn something that I never thought I would want to do before. If I were to remake my rocket the only thing I would do differently is have a larger surface area for the bottom fins, not add the top fins because the tops fins caused our rocket to spin a little which we didn't want, wrap the parachute differently so that it would actually open up, and tie the nose cone more securely to the shock cord so it wouldn’t blow off. I believe that I contributed a great amount into building our group’s rocket and I am very proud of the way it turned out. Our Design: Materials List:
- Balsa Wood Block - Balsa Wood Sheet - Tissue Paper - Wood Glue - Super Glue - Borax - Kraft Paper - Cutting Tool - Plastic Bag - 1'' PVC Pipe - Sand Paper - Tape - Large Rubber Band - Camera - String - Plastic Tube - Fuse - Empty Motor Casing Schedule: September 22- Get plans approved September 23- Build body of rocket September 26- Attach engine block. Start to build parachute recovery wadding and ejection charge September 27- Attach necessary equipment inside. Start to build nose and fins September 28- Attach nose and fins September 29- Build tester engine September 30- Launch rocket. Fix flaws of rocket and engine. October 3- Launch rocket with actual engine Building Process: Link to Final Rocket VideoFor the second rocket we kept the partners we had from the previous build. We were given the same materials as before and since we knew more about rockets my partner and I tweaked our design for a better flight performance. Click the link above to view the building process.
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